Private Investigations
by JuweWright
Summary: After McGee's birthday party, Abby wakes up in a foreign bed with a massive headache and a blackout... Strictly Tabby (I am obsessed) and planned as a longer thing (up to 10 chapters possible). Trying to be romantic and a bit funny but be warned I am just not good at this. Rating T just to be safe.
1. Chapter 1

PRIVATE INVESTIGATIONS

_N./A. Okay guys so someone came up to me after "Through the bitter days" complaining about the lack of romance in my Tabby stories. I'll try to do my best to make this one a bit more romantic on the obvious level. Don't expect too much though. I am not good at this in real life and fiction doesn't make it any better. Planning to make this a longer thing. Might have up to 10 parts in the end, but nothing's settled yet._

**Chapter 1 – The Morning After**

The sun sent a couple of brand new golden rays through the curtains into the bedroom. The light fell onto a leather jacket, a couple of black leather boots, a mini skirt, a white shirt and a red and black zipped hoodie. A pair of socks, a crumpled black blouse. All of this scattered across the floor of the room in a random fashion that would have been a good example for the law of entropy. Diffusion. Chaos is the natural state of things and you need energy to create order.

Abby Sciuto woke up because the sun was shining right into her face. Groaning, she covered her eyes with the back of her hand and turned away from the window towards the other side of the king sized bed, and jerked back.

This was not her bed. This was not her room. This was not her flat. But she was pretty sure she knew whom the flat, the room and the bed belonged to and the proprietor of all of those was lying right there next to her and smiled in his sleep. His short brown hair was ruffled and he looked completely relaxed. One of his arms was stretched out and she considered he might have been hugging her in his sleep.

What the hell was she doing in Tony's bed? She sat up and almost fainted. Better question than that: What was she doing in Tony's bed in a state of utter and complete nakedness? Next question: Why didn't she know?

She stood up and noticed a nagging pain behind her forehead. Okay, so that was the answer to one of the questions. Didn't really solve the mystery though. Even a completely drunk Abby would not sleep with Tony… or would she? Abby was not sure. The evidence was clear. The scattered clothes, her being naked, the fact that the duvets were tangled up and looked messy. Tony mumbled in his sleep and shifted his position.

Out of here! Immediately! If she was lucky, he would not remember anything either and if she was gone would not be able to tease her for the rest of her life. She was just fishing for her stockings that had somehow ended up under the bed, when she heard a grunt and a: "What the…", from above her head. She got hold of the stockings and sat up.

"Morning Tony", she smiled awkwardly. "How are you?"  
He stared at her with a baffled expression.

"What? Why? How?"

"Three very good questions and I don't have an answer", she replied, considered pulling the t-shirt over her head and got a whiff of sweat-smell that made her hesitate. Okay, they were both awake, none of them could remember anything so even Tony could not take the piss without humiliating himself. There was no point in running away.

"Mind if I use your shower? And could I borrow a shirt?"

He stared at her his eyes lingering on her breasts and buttocks. Noticed he was naked as well, blushed. Tony blushing. She would need to put that down in her notebook in red ink.

"Did we…?", he started.

She shrugged.  
"I don't have a clue. Can't remember anything. What were we doing last night anyways. What day is it?"

Tony glanced over to his alarm clock and told her the date, time and day. It was a Sunday and the day after McGee's birthday party. So that was what they had been doing.

"So, may I use the shower?"

He nodded, still not quite awake and back in reality. She went into the bathroom and took a long hot shower. There was nothing as refreshing as that. There was women's shampoo even. Probably leftovers from one of Tony's affairs. An affair that liked vanilla. Abby pulled a face. How could anyone like vanilla shampoo. Who wanted to smell like a pot of ice cream?

She tried to mix the vanilla stuff with Tony's own masculine note but it smelled even worse. Great, well at least she was clean now and not sweaty and disgusting any more. She was just rinsing the foam off her hair, when the door of the bathroom was opened only a couple of centimeters and a hand appeared.

"Abbs? I don't have anything that would be small enough to stay on your hips in terms of pants, but if you put a belt around this, it should be long enough for a dress."

And without a single glance, he had closed the door again. Abby sighed. Shit, he really didn't know what had happened otherwise he'd have been his cocky old self and taken the opportunity to watch her in the shower. Unless… unless he really despised the thought of having slept with her which for some reason felt worse than anything else.

She turned the water off, quickly dried herself with one of the towels and pulled the shirt over her head which was really long enough to go through as a dress. Not really her style but better than nothing. She looked at herself in the mirror and sighed. She did not particularly like the way she looked without makeup on. But her makeup was in her handbag and her handbag was probably somewhere in this flat but had not been in the bedroom so she'd have to go without her smoky eyes and dark lipstick for a bit.

When she came into the kitchen, Tony was already waiting for her. He had prepared two glasses of aspirin and handed her one. She noticed he had not done anything about his hair yet and there were manly stubbles on his cheeks. He was wearing faded jeans and a blue shirt but neither socks nor shoes which for some reason made her want to grab him right there and push him back into the bedroom. What the hell? She didn't fancy Tony. Well okay, she did fancy Tony in a way that a teenage schoolgirl fancied a popstar. He was way out of her league and she knew that. So she had not even tried to…

But they had woken up in the same bed. Naked. What had happened?

Tony grinned and sipped his aspirin.

"Know what, you look kind of strange with no makeup on."

She frowned.

"I mean, no offense, you look great, but…"

"I am not Abby without the makeup", she finished his sentence and drained her glass with one gulp. "I know. I feel strange without it."

"You look… younger…"


	2. Chapter 2

_A./N.: Someone pointed out that it's pretty obvious to tell from my writing that I am not American. Well yeah, it probably is, but I hope it doesn't spoil the fun, if there is some Brit-speak in the story (I'm not British either, but I lived in Britain for a while so my mind ticks in British English). I use it without thinking much about it and needed to be reminded of the fact that "flat" in BE is "apartment" in AE. So there might be British spelling, British idioms… _

_It took quite a while to get this part written and uploaded (I was admittedly lost in 221B Baker Street) but I promise I will be quicker from now on and get the other chapters up every couple of days. x Juwe_

Chapter 2 – First Investigations

Half an hour later they were ready to roll. Abby had turned into Abby again by applying three layers of makeup and braiding her hair. Tony thought that "younger" had been the wrong word after all. She did not look younger without the dark eyeliner and lipstick but rather more vulnerable.

"So what are we going to do now?", she asked when she sat down in the passenger seat of his car.

"We are going to investigate what happened", replied Tony and donned his sunglasses before pulling out into the street. "It's either that or I drive you home and we will never talk about this again and try to forget it."

They exchanged a glance and shook their heads simultaneously. There was no way, they could forget this.

"So where do we start? McGee's place?"  
"I thought we'd start at your place first."

She frowned.

"Why's that?"

"Because…", Tony made a small pause, "… you do not want to explain to McGee what happened or didn't happen or whatever, am I right?"

She shook her head, braids flying.

"Oh my God, no, he would not be able to take it."  
"He'd probably kill me on the spot out of jealousy."

"No he wouldn't."  
"Well, probably not, because most of the times the jealous guys actually kill their girlfriends… so he will kill you, and I will be killed by Ducky as soon as he finds out… or by Gibbs as soon as he finds out… I prefer Ducky I guess… but then Ducky can dissect people…"

Abby started to laugh but Tony had only been half-joking. He was pretty sure that neither McGee nor Gibbs would appreciate if anything had happened between him and Abby. McGee had been after her from day one. He never said anything, because the probie never said anything if it came to women, but Tony was neither blind nor dumb and he didn't even need his decades of experience or his infallible instincts to see that Timothy wanted Abby. Abby seemed to be completely unaware of it or pretended to be so and as long as it stayed that way, nothing would ever happen between these two.

Then there was Gibbs, who behaved like Abby's dad all the time. Gibbs, who would have killed everyone who ever hurt her without even blinking. Tony gulped. No. Neither McGee nor Gibbs were to know they had slept in the same bed… and probably more.

Abby was watching Tony drive and wondered what he was thinking of. The rant about being killed by the Timothy or Gibbs or Ducky had been so typical. But she knew that the sudden silence was also typical although he tried to act like he didn't have a deep side in front of others. He had never been able to blend her. After he had almost been blown up he had collapsed on the floor of her lab rather than to show his weakness anywhere else. She guessed she was the only one whom he dared to act naturally with. She had always assumed that this was because he did not see her either as another man he needed to out-macho nor as a woman he could prey on.

But things had changed and it might well be that in some momentary heat she had become one of these women. She bit her lip. If that was the case, would things change between them? Would he close the doors he had always held open for her? Would he build walls around himself just as he did with everyone else? He noticed her staring at him and grinned. She smiled back. Perhaps things didn't need to change either way.

They arrived at McGee's place at about half past one. The sun was shining and Abby squinted because her head still throbbed. The probie didn't look much better than she felt and the apartment smelt horrible. It reminded Abby of the days at school. That's what the boys' rooms had smelt like when they had been on the class trip in eighth grade. How did a grown-up man manage to produce that smell?

"Yuck", said Tony coming in after her. "Probie, what the hell? Open a window, pronto!"

"Okay, boss."

McGee opened the window and winced when a sunray fell on his face.

"Guys what's the matter? Has there been another murder?"

Abby was happy he was hung over. Only a Timothy with a hangover was able to assume that Tony would take Abby round to a crime scene.

"Not really. We bumped into each other by chance actually. I was wondering whether you could get me the phone number of that girl. You know blonde, big tits, talked a bit funny, guess she was Russian…"

The lie sounded so convincing that for a second even Abby was close to believing it. There had indeed be a woman who fit his description. She remembered her, bright smile, red dress, reeking of sexual tension, Tony's kind of girl actually.

McGee stared at his senior officer.

"Why didn't you ask Margot for her number yourself? She's Polish by the way. I know her from…", he hesitated and broke off. Abby had guessed that he either knew that girl from school or from some sort of role play. Her tendency had been school but his reaction spoke for role play. She decided she did not hate Margot as much as she had thought she did.

"Margot… so… yeah, I wanted to ask her, but I forgot and then I couldn't find her again and… you know how it goes."

McGee pulled a face that said "you know I don't have a clue how it goes".

Abby smiled at him reassuringly.  
"So why are you here?", he asked.

"Oh… I…", she grinned and started doing gesticulating. "You know… I was wearing one of my good luck necklaces… you know the one with the three skulls on the silver chain… and I was dancing because they had finally put on some good music and… well when I woke up this morning it was gone… so it must have fallen off… and I need it back because it's a lucky necklace and now I thought you might perhaps know if anyone picked it up."

McGee nodded.

"Sounds sensible to me, but have to disappoint you, I don't know anything about it. But if someone picked it up they'll contact me and I'll get it back to you, all right?"

Abby took his face in both hands and kissed him on the forehead.

"Thank you so much McGee. I'll leave you now and I'll take Tony with me, because it seems very clear to me that someone in this room needs a shower and it's not me nor the Italian guy."

Tony smiled.

"If you could just give me that number…"

McGee shook his head.

"Sorry bout that but I don't have Margot's number."

Tony stared at him.

"What do you mean you don't have her number?"

"I… I just don't have it."  
"You invite people to your birthday and you don't have their number?"  
"Look, Tony, not everyone is like you. I don't have her number but I can give you her nickname, if you care for that?"  
"Nick… name?"

"She's a pretty hardcore-fighting dark elf in World of Warcraft", explained McGee with a smug smile.

Tony's face went white.

"Ummm… forget about that, will you? Come on Abby I will give you a ride home."

They were almost through the door when McGee said: "You think you are already fit to drive again?"

"Why shouldn't I?"  
"Because you - both of you actually – were pretty hammered last night. I've never heard Abby sing along to country music before and I am pretty sure I never saw you dance to a Nightwish song, diNozzo."


End file.
